Newly appointed U.S. Ambassador to China Terry Branstad said Wednesday the United States would like to see Nobel Peace Prize-winning activist Liu Xiaobo treated elsewhere for cancer, and that the two countries must work together on human rights.

Liu, 61, was jailed for 11 years in 2009 for "inciting subversion of state power" after he helped write a petition known as "Charter 08" calling for sweeping political reforms.

He is being treated in a hospital in the northern city of Shenyang for late-stage liver cancer after he was granted medical parole, his lawyer said Monday.